2018.12.10

This week we saw Astralis win $1,000,000 for the Intel Grand Slam to continue their dominance on top of the mountain. We also had another DreamHack event as well as SuperNova Malta over in St Julian's. This week we also see for the first time only 29 teams entering the tier list.

Reasons for Selected Teams (Movement or Roster Changes)

mousesports (+1) - mousesports showed they could hang with other A tier teams again in Odense.

North (-1) - North continues their plummet through the rankings due to an embarrassing showing in Odense.

Renegades (+1) - Renegades seems to have returned to the form we saw at IEM Sydney, which means that if they continue to regain that form, they might be able to challenge higher tier teams again.

Ghost (+1) - After a decent run at DH Atlanta, Ghost again showed they can at least hang with mid-tier teams on a regular basis at ESL Pro League Season 8 Finals.

Bravado (Debut) - Bravado, the first South African team to be showcased in our rankings, do so by their fantastic performance at DH Open Winter.

x6tence Galaxy (Debut) - x6 proved themselves at DH Open Winter to be deserving of a spot in the rankings.

We only have 29 teams in this edition of our rankings due to the fact that Esports Kingdom does not feel that any other teams are at the level we could consider worthy of D-Tier.

Also, three teams have fallen off the bottom of the rankings due to recent results; Gambit, LDLC and Kinguin.

S-Tier

Astralis

A-Tier

FaZe

NaVi

Liquid

MIBR

mousesports

B-Tier

NiP

NRG

C-Tier

North

BIG

ENCE

HellRaisers

Fnatic

compLexity

OpTic

Renegades

Ghost

D-Tier

TyLoo

G2

Heroic

Cloud9

ex-SS

Rogue

Vega

AVANGAR

Luminosity

Vitality

Bravado

x6tence

Explanation of Tiers

S-Tier: Teams you expect to win every tournament they are in. They are the current kings of the Counter-Strike scene.

A-Tier: Teams that can be expected to easily beat teams in the tiers below, and may even upset an S-Tier team once in a while. Regularly makes the playoffs.

B-Tier: Teams that; Have shown recent potential or Former A-Tier teams with recent and extended periods of poor play.

C-Tier: Teams that; Have had decent showings at recent international LANs or Teams that may have dropped off recently, but have historically decent placements and can potentially make the playoffs.

D-Tier: Teams that have appeared at a few international LANs recently, likely via qualifiers, but have not shown skill consistently on the level of the other tiers. Rarely make playoffs if they ever have.

These rules are not exact, and they are not hard and fast. There are always exceptions. If there were not, it would become impossible to rank teams due to the nature of the game.